Skywatcher HEQ5 with a mak 180?

[ilove1995]

Hi,

The after market motors on my eq3-2 mount have packed up so this could be a good excuse for me to upgrade.

I want to continue imaging The Sun, Moon and planets using my sw mak 127 but at some point I will be looking to upgrade to a mak 180. The HEQ5 can apparently handle 11kg for imaging so a mak 180 along with my canon 600d will probably be close to this 11kg limit. Would anyone with a similar setup be able to give me some advice, particularly taking into account imaging solar objects.

Thanks

Al

[nightfisher]

its what i use, 180 pro on HEQ5 for solar system viewing and imaging

[ilove1995]

Thanks nightfisher, what camera do use use with that setup?

[Steve Ward]

My Mak180Pro sits atop an HEQ5Pro too , with a 1000D hanging from a Revelation SCT focuser , handles it with ease.

[ilove1995]

Thanks Steve, I was hoping you would be adding a comment. Is the revelation sct focuser you use motorised?

[Steve Ward]

It's fitted with a Skywatcher "autofocus" motor , as are all my scopes now , and it's controlled remotely via USB from the laptop using a Homebrew unit from Dion from the Shed.

Turns the 10:1 into 100:1 effectively .

He's stopped making them now but I'm sure someone else has taken the building of them on , I'll see if I can find him.

The unit just plugs into the hand controller socket on the motor.

Here's a link to the relavent thread ... http://www.astronomy...lit=usb focuser

[ilove1995]

That's great, thanks Steve.

[nightfisher]

Thanks nightfisher, what camera do use use with that setup?

I have 3 camera set ups, an Olympus pen micro four thirds dslr, a pentax optio T30 point an shoot for Lunar a-focal and a webcam for high res

[ilove1995]

Thanks nightfisher.

[HAL9000]

I also use a 180 pro Mak on an HEQ5 Pro, never had any problems & taken some decent images of the moon with a big heavy Canon 7D hanging off the back!